Sunday, March 4, 2012

My God has a sense of humour....

Much to the consternation of my family.....well actually just my mother, I have had issues with the Catholic Church for the past two years. Ever since the debaucle of the child abuse scandals, I have not attended mass. This is not a reflection on the two priests that I know personally,either due to my school life or the fact that I live in a small Irish village. In fact, they are both fabulous at their work/vocation. My gripe goes almost to the top I'm taking it that God himself is at the very top!
When the scandals broke the Vatican washed their hands of it and basically said
"Deal with it yourselves."
To me, this is no way for the leaders of any organisation to behave in times of crisis. So I kinda washed my hands of them.
Of course its very difficult to leave the church, especially after years of instruction/indoctrination/brain-washing. So I found myself , this Lent, thinking that I really should be doing something extra. So I decided that I would go to mass every Sunday, not in my parish church, but in the Camillian's monastery, in the church that Dad built. So it was more to be closer to him than to the church.
The priest gave a great sermon. He was saying that just because it was Lent, we were not be be going around with a gloomy face. He said that the most important thing to have in life is a sense of humour, be it in the face of Lent or recession.My sentiments exactly.
He went on to tell the following anecdote about Pope John Paul II and his compatriot, MotherTeresa.
It seems that Pope JP II canonized more saints in his papacy that all the previous popes
PUT TOGETHER!
A young nun in Mother Theresa's convent was very eager and asked her
"Mother, what do I have to do to become a saint?"
Mother Theresa looked at her and with a twinkle in her eye, replied.
"I'd advise you to drop dead. The fella we have now is canonizing everyone!"I do so hope that story is true because if it is, then it restores a little bit of my faith in the humanity of the church.